


slipping through the cracks (of your cold embrace)

by swisstae



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Anal Sex, Angst and Feels, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Arguments, Auror Draco Malfoy, Auror Harry Potter, Auror Partners, Cursed objects, Established Relationship, H/D Hurt!Fest 2020, Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, Heavy Angst, Hopeful Ending, M/M, Memory Magic, Misunderstandings, Nightmares, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Sectumsempra Scene | Draco Malfoy and Harry Potter's Duel in the Bathroom, Self Loathing Draco Malfoy, Soft sex, Spoilery Warning in End Notes, Therapy, all the angst basically, cathartic crying can be found here, considering they ARE grown-ups in this fic, nightmares being lived out, okay so this is just two silly bois who need to have a grown up conversation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-19
Updated: 2020-09-19
Packaged: 2021-03-07 01:08:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,406
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26358493
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/swisstae/pseuds/swisstae
Summary: Draco Malfoy and Harry Potter. Archenemies at school, on opposite sides of the war that tore the Wizarding world in half -- and yet, lovers who overcame all odds to be together.That's where it all starts. And maybe, that's where it all ends.(in which Draco finds a cursed object, shit goes down, and everyone needs to talk about Feelings.)
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter
Comments: 25
Kudos: 90
Collections: H/D Hurt!Fest 2020





	slipping through the cracks (of your cold embrace)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [EvAEleanor](https://archiveofourown.org/users/EvAEleanor/gifts).



> for prompt #38
> 
> for EvAEleanor- I'd started writing this fic before I'd even got back my confirmation mail from the mods, because I was so intrigued by the prompt. I hope it meets your expectations. 
> 
> thank you, Angel. this fic would not have existed without your tireless support of my work, and I am so grateful for your entire existence. love you to the moon and back.  
> and to Ringelchen, you are truly a champion amongst men. thank you for your relentless feedback and hours of support that have made this work all the better for it. 
> 
> and to the mods, a heartfelt thank you for being so patient and for granting me my extension which was sorely needed in order to make this work truly complete.

**PART I**

_Every Night and every Morn, some to Misery are born.  
Every Morn and every Night, some are born to Sweet Delight.  
Some are born to Sweet Delight._

__

__

Some are born to Endless Night. 

_~ William Blake, Auguries of Innocence_

—

Draco is bloody sick of this assignment already. It’s been hours, and there’s no sign of a single soul in this supposedly ‘teeming-with-Death-Eaters’ abandoned house. _Former_ Death Eaters, of course, the kind that had served You-Know-Who loyally and unswervingly.

He counts as a former Death Eater himself, technically — which is probably why Robards was so hesitant on giving him this assignment. What, did he think Draco was going to run off to them with his tail between his legs and beg them to take him back? It’s been seven bloody years since the Final Battle at Hogwarts, and people still look at him with suspicion and fear, walking away from him when they pass him on the streets; dropping eye contact when they see him; hushing their children when they try to speak to him. 

He has absolutely no desire to return to that life. A part of him — the masochistic, foolish part of him — likes to wonder how different things would be if he hadn’t been pressured into joining the ranks of the Death Eaters; if his parents lives hadn’t been in the balance when Volde— You-Know-Who decided to make him the scapegoat for their crimes. (Try as he might, the terror never leaves him. He may have defied him, been disloyal to him, but he still cannot say his name. Not without breaking out into a cold sweat, wondering if he’s summoned him back, no matter how impossible it sounds.)

Of course, another part of him wonders if he could’ve ever managed to snag Boy Wonder if he hadn’t gone through all that. 

Harry fucking Potter. God, how he’d hated that twat. 

In all honesty, that probably wasn’t true. He’d seen him first at Madam Malkin’s, the young boy who looked utterly bewildered at all that was happening around him, and something inside Draco had ached at the thought of finally making a friend. And he’d been snubbed, rebuffed and fuck, did it hurt. But he never hated Harry. Couldn’t. He’d just- well, he’d loved him even then, but it simmered underneath a thin veneer of dislike and antagonistic behavior for the next seven years. Pansy had teased him about his hopeless infatuation with Potter since the third year, and her pointed giggles every time he brought up Harry’s name had been the bane of Draco’s existence. 

Of course, the War forged stronger bonds amongst the survivors. It was inevitable, really, to form a tentative truce with Potter and his band of goody-two-shoes. And then of course, he joined the training to become an Auror. 

It just- it just fell into place after that. They didn’t hate each other anymore, but it was still a little odd to have to work together. But having to go out on missions together, watching each other’s backs in the field out there — it tends to allow people to get closer. One thing led to another and, well. They’d managed to push through years of hatred and mutual animosity to become something far more, something Draco had been secretly dreaming of since forever. 

It’d been amazing, to say the least. He was the happiest he’d ever been. Which of course, says a lot about his life because he’s only now realising that happiness doesn't have to revolve around money or possessions or how famous or pure-blooded your family is. 

Happiness is waking up in the morning to the person you love the most in the world. Happiness is being on the same wavelength as someone, knowing them so intimately that you can predict their thoughts and actions. It’s finding out the way he fits against someone so perfectly, their ragged and raw edges fitting together seamlessly like two pieces of a puzzle no one could ever solve. 

That’s what Harry is: the missing piece of his puzzle, the piece he thought he’d never find, the piece he thought never existed because he’s never felt this- this feeling of satisfaction and contentment before. 

Of course, good things can’t always last. _Especially not when you’re Draco Malfoy,_ he thinks bitterly. But it’d been perfect while it lasted, he can attest to that much-

Draco’s knocked out of his musings by the sudden surge in magic from the mausoleum. His Dark Mark glows with the intensity of the force. He frowns. If there’s no one inside, what the hell caused that pulse of magic that’s surrounding the house? 

For a moment, he considers checking in with Robards. His mission had been to confirm the information they had regained and to report back, not just saunter into the house without knowing who or what might be waiting for him there. 

He furrows his brows. Going back would mean... seeing Harry. And he really, really doesn’t want to do that right now. He grits his teeth. Fuck it, he’s going in.

—

Draco moves silently, his robes shifting behind him as he turns the corner. It’s strange here, like no one has actually come here in ages, the floor thick with a layer of dust. There is a faint residue of magic here, he can sense it, but beyond that? He’s really not sure what he’s dealing with here. He should call for back-up, tell them that this isn’t just the scouting mission they’d all thought it to be, but he’s too proud to admit he needs help dealing with seemingly absolutely nothing.

As soon as he turns the corner, however, he’s suddenly accosted by a memory— 

_The door opens, Harry stepping through it slowly, running a hand through his hair as he shrugs off his robes. He gives Draco a tired smile, dropping off a kiss on his head as he goes into their bathroom — presumably to take a shower. He’s late, again, and Draco’s getting really fed-up. He’s simmering with poorly concealed anger, but he doesn’t want to explode. No, he doesn’t, and he doesn’t understand this new feeling. Of wanting to snap, to stop filtering every word he says, to aim where it fucking hurts so that he could inflict pain on someone the same way he’s hurting right now._

Draco snaps his eyes open, his chest heaving like he’s just sprinted a couple a couple of miles. Why had he suddenly thought of that? That- that was a memory so fragmented he’d barely remembered it, despite it having happened only a couple of weeks ago.

He takes a few steps forward, and stops. The aura of magic is stronger here, so strong in fact that he can actually see the dim green energy emitting from the end of the hall. It’s his last chance to get out of here, call for some back-up to help him deal with this. It would be better to call someone to help him out here — he’s not an expert in lifting charms, and he’s definitely not the best at breaking curses. That’s more of Harry’s thing.

Fuck, he’s descending into a another memory, his eyes sliding shut—

 _“You never spend time with me any more!” Draco spits out, his eyes blazing as he rounds on Harry. “You never want to be here, at home, you just keep taking more shifts and you’re just-” He trails off then, his eyes seeking Harry’s as he suddenly blurts out, “Do you still love me, Harry? Have you ever loved me?” He’s sick of having to pretend everything is alright, not when it’s not, not when he feels like he’s just another fucked-up person Harry wanted to fix with his saviour-complex and couldn’t._

His head is swimming, his vision is blurring at the edges. He doesn’t feel sick, but it is getting warm here and he’s itching to remove his thick Auror robe. He hobbles forward, his wand hand drooping with every step. He’s not getting weaker, no, it’s just a side-effect of wading through magic this strong. He’s okay, he’s just—

 _Harry’s talking now, his words a nervous babble— “Of course I do, Draco, how could you ever think I didn’t? I’ll admit, it’s not always easy, but we’ve been together for a long time now.” And that’s somehow even worse, that Harry’s admitting that he’s hard to love, that he’s with Draco because they’ve been together for so long now and what’s the point of breaking up when Draco’s always going to trail around behind him like a lost puppy in need of salvation?_

Fuck. He should’ve called for back-up. But he’s so close now, he just has to push open the door and— 

_“If that’s how you feel, maybe we should just- just end it.” His voice doesn’t ring with victory, at having one-upped Harry in this stupid fight. It just sounds hollow, each word a lead weight on his chest. Harry’s staring at him, his green eyes large and shocked as he tries to reach forward, to touch Draco, and Draco moves away, watching from the corner of his eye as Harry wilts, his hand clenching into a fist in thin air._

_He hates this. He wants to run back to Harry, wants to tell him that he’s a fucking git because all Draco has ever done in his life is love that man, even when he didn’t know what love was. Draco loves him. And- it fucking hurts, but Harry probably doesn’t love him back, not with that same, all-consuming intensity. He sees someone who is struggling, who needs his help. And with his fucking saviour-complex, he just feels sorry for Draco. He doesn’t love him. And those are the facts._

_He wraps his robes around himself and calls out hollowly, “I’m going. Don’t wait for me,” and leaves the toasty warmth of his house, their house, to walk out into the darkness._

Draco collapses against the door. Whatever the artifact is — and it _has_ to be a Dark artifact, because nothing else could emit this kind of malicious energy. It is sapping his strength, and yet he can’t bring himself to call for help because he can handle it, damn it! 

Even to himself, the excuse is flimsy. He can sense the magic, the energy it emits. It’s probably part of the curse, to lure him in, to make him let down his defenses. He’s an Auror, he should know better — they’ve trained for such situations, obviously — but never like this, not this sort of Dark magic. His eyes slide shut in resignation, and he presses a pale hand onto the door, pushing it open.

—

It’s... absurdly normal. The green glow has faded almost completely, and the only thing that remains in the dim room is a hand held mirror on top of an ornate wooden table. The rest of the room is bare, highlighting the way the mirror seems to be the main object of attraction.

This is so wrong. He presses the pads of his fingers to his temple, massaging it lightly. He needs to go, he needs to call someone, anyone. 

The mirror glows green, sharper and clearer in here, wrenching his thoughts away. His mind is sluggish, the rapid fire speed of his thoughts slowing down. He needs to... he should... God, he _has_ to hold that mirror. 

Every fibre of his being is screaming at him to stop — he can feel the energy pulsating through him as he moves closer to the mirror — but he’s helpless against this sort of force. He grasps the edges of the table, catching his breath as he wipes away the sweat that’s matting his blond bangs, hanging in his eyes like a curtain. He remembers coming across Erised in his first year — the temptation to see what the future held in store for him far too great to resist. This feels a thousand times stronger, and he can’t- he can’t hold out anymore. 

He grits his teeth, and stretches out a hand to lift the mirror. He can see his reflection, his eyes a dull grey and his hair plastered to his face. He looks sick, like he hasn’t eaten in days — Harry would murder him if he saw him like this. 

For a moment, nothing happens. And then the mirror glows a sickening green, and the world melts away around him in a blur of color and sound. Draco screams, once, and lets the darkness consume him.

—

Draco falls, for what seems like forever, grasping blindly at the darkness that rushes past him. He’s blind, his eyes blinking repeatedly to try and see anything in the cursed blankness around him. Unfortunately, he can hear the sound of the wind in his ears as it grows and grows, almost deafening him, until it just stops.

 _He_ stops. He’s not falling anymore, he’s just... suspended in midair. It’s like he’s floating, but then his foot hits the floor and suddenly, everything is a rush of color and sensations. He’s flying across green fields, but he’s not on a broom — his hair whips about in the wind, he smells pine nuts and musky earth — and then he’s floating again, weightless but there are too many colors, it’s far too bright for him to see anything— 

The onslaught of sensation stops just as suddenly as it started. He hands heavily into a scene not unlike a memory from a Pensieve, but the colors are far sharper, everything with just that little edge to it. It’s too bright, too in-focus, but Draco makes himself pay attention to what’s happening in the room. 

With a shock, he realizes that it’s his parents, his mother lying down in a large four-poster bed in Malfoy Manor. It’s one of the spare bedrooms, the one he used to play in when he grew older. _She looks so young,_ he thinks. Her face is unlined, and her hair is still cornsilk gold, nothing like the flaxen strands that he’s so used to seeing now. His father — _Merlin, he’s smiling!_ — sits down next to her on the bed, clutching a blanket that is wriggling, now that Draco can actually see what is happening. 

The blanket moves and Draco peers over his father’s shoulder to see a shock of white-blond hair and a chubby little baby gurgling in his arms. His large grey eyes find Draco’s own, and the baby giggles, his meaty fists waving in the air as his father coos at him. 

Merlin’s beard, that’s him. It’s Draco Malfoy— hardly six months old, but oh _so_ very different. He doesn’t know if the baby can actually see him now. It’s highly unlikely, but he doesn’t quite know where he is either. Is he trapped in the past? Is this a memory? If so, then whose is it? As soon as he thinks it, however, the scene melts away, taking his smiling parents away as they hold their precious child. 

No. No! He doesn’t want to leave that memory, he wants to stay in it. He wants to imagine that the fond smiles Lucius shoots the child in his arms are meant for _him,_ the adult who craved affection from his parents but never found it. He wants to believe that they loved him, that they never stopped caring about him even when they had to keep up appearances for the rest of the Wizarding World. The Malfoys are an old family, set in their ways and Draco always believed that their love was beneath the surface, that they weren’t allowed to show him any open affection— but that tiny glimpse has left him wanting so much more. 

The fading away of the scene brings him back to that void, the blackness of space where he can’t even see himself. He closes his eyes, feeling weak at the knees. Fuck. Where the everloving fuck has he landed? 

Is this Erised? A fragment of it, that shows people their innermost desires? Things they’ve always wanted? 

_No, Draco Malfoy. I am not Erised._

The voice is sweet, almost plaintive. It sounds like a prayer, an answer to what he’s been looking for. But Draco can’t tell where it’s coming from. Is it booming around him, or is it just in his head? He cannot even tell if it’s male or female. It’s sweet, but it has an undertone of something- something horrible underneath, like something festering inside himself. He’s not so sure it’s about his innermost desires anymore — he wants that life, that love from his parents. But the feeling he had, that wasn’t longing. 

That was envy. Jealousy. That was far more carnal in nature than just pure want. 

_Very good._ The voice sounds pleased, its sweetness a mockery of how utterly lost he feels right now. _The others took much longer to realise this crucial fact._

Draco looks up into the darkness. “Which others?” His voice cracks, too loud in the empty space. This is important, he knows, this is something he has to remember. But he’s so tired, all he wants to do is curl up and sleep. His head pounds with an intensity he has only ever associated with migraines, and God, he can’t even keep his eyes open. 

The voice chuckles, a harsh sound that is at odds with the mellifluous nature of the words. It almost sounds smug, but that shouldn’t be possible— 

_I am not your innermost desires, Draco Malfoy. I am all your worst nightmares, your endless night._

Draco takes it back. The voice is most decidedly smug. _You have barely scratched the surface of what true pain can feel like. How it can slice into you, hurt you beyond you could imagine. How it never heals, not even with time._

The voice continues, earnest and sweet, like it’s promising to give him everything he’s ever wanted. _I will show you. I will make you feel pain beyond anything you have felt before, Draco Malfoy. I can only hope you survive the experience._

—and the world rushes around him again.

—

Draco lands into a moving picture that’s far too sharp for a memory. The sick feeling only grows in intensity as scenes move past him too quickly for him to understand what is going on.

He’s nearly five now, zipping around in the fields behind the Manor on his first broomstick, laughing jovially as he catches the wondrous Snitch; he’s six and lying in bed when he gets pneumonia for the first time because he stood outside in the rain for far too long, but _oh,_ the thrill of seeing the old world being washed away to leave a beautiful new one in its place was too good to miss; he’s seven when his father backhands him for speaking back to him, and he never meant to do that, but Draco knows what it means, he knows that it’s time for him to grow up now. 

On and on it goes, scenes from his life, some that he’d forgotten, some he remembered with too awful clarity, until it stops suddenly at a point in his life he can remember with painstaking detail. 

Fuck. 

He’s standing in Madam Malkin’s robe shop, and it’s not the first time he’s been here, but now he’s getting fitted for Hogwarts — and he’s almost bubbling with joy, but he can’t show it in public, of course. He’s come alone in here, because he’s a big boy now and he can do these things on his own. Mother had gone to look at a wand for him, and Lucius was in Flourish and Blotts next door. 

He’s a young child — Draco realises that he doesn’t remember just how tiny he used to be — and a layer of chub covers his face, his eyes still wide with innocence. He stands next to Madam Malkin, and picks out a few colors for robes. Mother always said that a deep green brought out his aristocratic features, and while first years are only allowed black robes, he thinks she won’t mind him buying another one that’s just so pretty. 

And then he enters. His younger self doesn’t know who he is yet, of course, but Draco does. And his heart sinks, because he knows exactly what’s going to happen. 

“Hogwarts, too?” he asks. He’s wildly pleased, because he’s never met anyone who his parents hadn’t carefully vetted before allowing him to interact with them. It’s all well and good to make sure he doesn’t have any unsavoury acquaintances but now he’s old enough to tell for himself. And the boy who’s just walked in has a sweet face, a little bewildered at all of it, but he seems nice enough for Draco to make friends with. 

_Fuck._ Draco watches as his younger self talks inanely of brooms and how first years aren’t allowed to play, and yet he only has eyes for the young boy with the broken glasses, who looks so skinny. The boy who would soon consume his every waking thought. He wants to redo this meeting, he wants so badly for the chance to rewrite history so he doesn’t set himself up for the rejection he knows is coming. 

His younger self doesn’t know what the boy thinks of him just yet, because he’s always been taught that people are impressed by power and money, but the boy doesn’t seem to be reacting to any of his stories. He wants the boy to like him, but he can’t be too effusive, that turns people off more than a mud-blood trying to do magic. (not that he knows what the comparison means, he’s just heard his Father use it often and laugh right after he said it.) 

“Know what house you’ll be in, yet? No? Well, no one really knows until they get there, do they, but I know I'll be in Slytherin, all our family have been— imagine being in Hufflepuff, I think I'd leave, wouldn't you?" 

All he wants is to be just like his father, his hero. He wants to be someone his father can be proud of, someone who will bring pride to the Malfoy name. Slytherin is the only option for him. None of the other houses are good enough to be held up to the standard of Slytherin, who favors the best and the brightest — and of course, hardly any muggles could be sorted into it. They were filthy people who had no standing or status in the wizarding world. 

Draco knows everything that’s going on in his younger self’s mind. It’s almost like it’s being projected for him to see, his own thoughts intermingling with his eleven year old self. Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived, had walked into Diagon Alley for the first time, and here Draco was — the first person he’d ever met that was his own age and a wizard. Merlin, he’d been so enamoured by the way his father walked and talked that he’d tried to do everything exactly like him, and in doing so, he’d pushed away the first person who had caught his fancy. The first person he could’ve made a good impression on, but instead managed to ruin any chances of doing so. 

He can see the mounting desperation on Harry’s face, the way he’s being compared to the bullies who had tortured Harry his whole life till then. He can see that so clearly, and he has half a mind to shake his younger self, to tell him to _stop,_ to look at how _uncomfortable_ Harry is. 

He tunes back into what his younger self is thinking: He wants this boy to be in Slytherin. It’s absurd, because he’s hardly even spoken throughout their entire conversation, but Draco likes the look of him. His wild, messy hair is not exactly endearing but it could be tamed under Draco’s careful hands, he just knows it. His eyes are a bright, dazzling green and Draco’s always thought his own eyes were pretty, but he’s old enough to admit that the startling color of this boy’s eyes are superior to his own dull grey. 

But when he insults Hagrid, even his younger self seems to realise that he seems to have crossed a line. Harry’s green eyes turn cold, his entire face closing off with such deliberate contempt that Draco feels as though he’s been punched. Only, a punch would feel less painful than the curl of Harry’s lip as he looks at Draco scornfully, walking out with his head held high. 

Draco feels it again. The sick, swooping feeling in his stomach intensifies as he tries to hold on to the image — but he’s lost to the whirling rush of emotions and colors — only to emerge on the Hogwarts train. 

He opens the door to the compartment, only to be nearly pushed to the side when his younger self walks in, Crabbe and Goyle flanking his either side. 

_Crabbe and Goyle._ Or rather, Vincent and Greg. He’d never actually called them by their given names, not throughout those years that they followed him around, his lackeys rather than his friends. He’d never managed to make a real friend until Pansy and Blaise came around, but even they saw that becoming friends with the Malfoy heir would be beneficial for them when school was over. Of course, none of that panned out quite the way anyone would have expected. 

He watches as Ron snickers at his name, and his younger self shooting back a barbed quip just as poisonous as he had been brought up to be. He watches, his breath bated, as he utters the fateful words, words that would haunt him for years to come. “You don't want to go making friends with the wrong sort. I can help you there.” He holds out a hand. 

The first hand he’d ever extended, in friendship. (And the last, because he’d never wanted to leave himself open to that kind of hurt ever again.) 

And he can see it, the way Harry’s face turns twisted and ugly for a second, the way he bites out scathingly, “I think I can tell who the wrong sort are for myself, thank you.” —and he can feel how his heart breaks in dual time. His own, and his younger self’s too. He’s hurt. He’s never actually had someone not want him — and it’s not the prideful sort of anger he’d have expected. It’s a deeper, more visceral sort of pain and Draco has no doubt it’s being amplified due to the mirror’s cursed properties. 

He closes his eyes against the onslaught of sensations as the scene melts away in a burst of color and sound, pulling him away from that first failed handshake into the void of inky darkness.

—

Draco opens his eyes and he’s sixteen now, standing in front of a cracked mirror in the sixth floor boy’s bathroom. Moaning Myrtle is next to him, her ghostly voice a croon in his ears as he sobs his fucking guts out.

Draco Lucius Malfoy. For as long as he can begin to remember, he has carried that name with pride and his head held high, when people look at him with awe and sometimes a little bit of fear — and Draco fucking loved it, ate up their admiration and attention. 

But that was _before._ Before his dad was sent to Azkaban, before You-Know-Who took up residence in his family manor, before he was told to carry out this task successfully, or his parents would have to bear the brunt of his failure. Before he’d almost gotten Katie Bell and the Weasel killed because he couldn’t fucking do it, he couldn’t go up to Dumbledore and kill him off. 

Draco can feel his desperation, his anger and fear at the situation he has been thrust into — amplified as it is, through the dual sensations — yet he can only stand and watch as one of his worst memories plays out in front of him again. A memory he has tried watching before, only to have to be pulled out of immediately because he couldn’t do it, couldn’t watch himself almost be murdered on the bathroom floor by a boy he’s always loved. 

He can see Harry standing in the crack of the doorway, his green eyes wide with shock. He knows the moment his younger self catches sight of Harry in the broken mirror, when he whirls around quick as a whip, his wand hand raised to fire off the first hex that comes to mind. 

He can feel the rage of his counterpart, his abject misery. He can feel the pain of never being enough, never allowed to be more than his name. 

He’s not proud of it, no, but he hurls a Cruciatus at Harry — an Unforgivable Curse, and for good reason — and it’s so weak, so fucking weak, it’s like his mind has caught up to the fact that he can’t ever hurt this boy. That he can’t possibly even think about torturing him, that he can’t do anything without revealing his broken, bitter heart tattooed with thorns and blood and love for Harry Potter. 

And then he feels it. For a second, he wonders if thinking the words could pull them into existence, as if thinking about Harry and love in the same sentence has caused his bleeding heart to be pulled out of his chest, bared for the whole world to see. 

He collapses onto the bathroom floor, upright one second and down the next, his white shirt slowly turning red with the patchwork of slashes pulling his body apart by the threads. He’s in so much pain that he feels numb for a minute, his nerve endings fried from so much sensory overload. 

Draco’s helpless. All he can do is watch, watch and repeat the horrific experience he thought he could push to the back of his mind. But he’s here now, and he’s watching it unfold in far greater detail than he could’ve ever remembered. 

Snape comes out of nowhere, a blur of black as he casts a spell around Draco, his magic leaving a soothing touch that Draco desperately craves. But all he can register are wide green eyes that stare at him with shock yet again, pink lips opening and closing as they whisper, “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” with every breath— 

— and then he closes his eyes and everything goes black again.

—

He lands. It feels like cool marble below his questing fingertips, but he doesn’t know. He calls out into the void, his voice scratchy like he’s been crying. _Maybe he has,_ he thinks distantly. _Maybe he’s been crying alone in a dusty room and no one will ever know._

“What are you? What do you want from me?” 

_I want your pain, Draco Malfoy._ The voice is as fathomless as ever, but there’s almost something wicked about the way it shapes the syllables of his name, as though it knows a secret that he doesn’t. _I want you bent to your knees in agony, I want you to scream as you relive all of your most painful memories, I want your tears as they hit the floor because you cannot stop them any longer._

Draco squeezes his eyes shut, but it doesn’t stop the tear trickling down his left cheek. Fuck. He doesn’t want to give in, to allow the voice to win, but he can’t help it. He hates the way he has no choice, no choice but to watch as he falls headlong into one nightmare into another, memories so potent that he knows he won’t ever be able to sleep without them invading his mind again and again and again. 

_Yes. Cry for me, Draco Malfoy. Let me taste the tears of your despair._

Draco punches the floor next to him in rage, but his hand goes through thin air and he’s falling again, tumbling through the darkness into his own personal hell.

—

It’s dark, but there’s the sound of wind rushing by, the clear skies lit up with clusters of stardust. He’s somewhere outside, he thinks to himself wearily, and then comes to an abrupt halt. He knows this. Even as his brain catches up to what his eyes are witnessing, he’s already scrunched them shut. As though that will make the scene melt away.

He’s on the roof of the Astronomy Tower, where the Dark Mark lingers. He’s on the roof of the fucking Astronomy Tower, where Professor Dumbledore is going to make an appearance any moment now, and be murdered in cold blood by a man he’d always thought to be ruthless, but not a stone cold killer. 

He knows this because this is the last time he’d ever set foot in the place. 

And then he sees them. Dumlbledore, old and frail, hunched over on his broom-- and fuck, but Harry Potter is on the second broom, his right hand keeping a steadying grasp on Dumbledore’s broom as they land on the roof. And he knows, of course he does, because Harry’s told him about this night. He knows what happened, what transpired on that awful, awful night because he was there to witness it. And Draco also knows that Harry doesn’t blame him for what happened, because everyone including Draco himself knew he didn’t have the stomach to follow through with what he had been tasked to do by the Dark Lord. 

But it’s different, isn't it -- to objectively know that something happened, and to see it with your own eyes? 

He watches how Harry slips on that damned Invisibility Cloak (Draco hates that cloak, mostly because Harry thinks he’s nigh invincible in it and jumps into dangerous situations without a single concern for his safety. Most of all, he hates the way the cloak makes him feel, so worried and pathetically in love with the man that he hates the idea of him ever getting hurt.) and walks over to the door closing in on the spiralled staircase, only to be frozen immobile. It’s the same door that sixteen year old Draco bursts out of, his _Expelliarmus!_ catching Dumbledore, whose wand falls from the top of the tower. 

He’s so frail, his younger self. So sickly pale, so thin. His eyes are ringed with dark circles, and the haunted look in his eyes is one Draco knows he’ll find lurking in there for years to come. He sees it every time he looks into the mirror.

And yet, he raises his wand, trembling with fear, his hands shaking as he tries to stall — for someone to come see him or for someone to come save him, he doesn’t know. 

He talks and talks, goaded into answering Dumbledore’s questions. He smiles, a small brittle one that is barely the twist of his lips, when Dumbledore praises him for being clever enough to link both of the Vanishing Cabinets successfully. 

Draco knows why. He remembers Harry having asked him once — _why, why would you smile at being praised for almost killing two people?_ — but he couldn’t tell him. He couldn’t tell him that all his life, all he’d ever craved was recognition. From his parents who treated him like an inconvenience; from his teachers who thought he was smart, but too arrogant; from his friends — but who knows if he’d ever even had any? 

And here it came, from the Dark Lord himself, a chance to remove the blight on his family’s name. 

He hadn’t anticipated having to watch his teacher being murdered and then ingested brutally on the dining table, the one he used to eat crystallised pineapple on as a child. He hadn’t known that his joining the ranks as a Death Eater was because the Dark Lord wanted for his father to pay, to face the repercussions of having failed him. He didn’t think at all, so happy was he to have caught someone’s eye for once in his life. 

(And that was partially the reason as to why he thinks he loves Harry so much. Harry’s always noticed him, some way or another.) 

Katie Bell, the Weasel — they were accidents. They were half-hearted, childish attempts at showing the Dark Lord that he was trying, that he was making an attempt to kill Dumbledore. He felt so fucking guilty about all of them, he cried himself to sleep every night. But he couldn’t do it. He couldn’t make himself go up to Dumbledore's office and kill him outright. 

But here he was, Dumbledore at his mercy — or was it the other way around? — and all he had to do was stand up straight, point his wand at him and utter the Killing Curse. He just had to pull himself together. 

Draco remembers this. The way he let the tears that had been threatening to escape since the Death Eaters walked this castle, the way he screamed hoarsely, “He’ll kill me! He’ll kill my entire family, and I can’t- I have to kill you!” 

He remembers being tempted. To lower his wand, to join the side of the Light. He remembers that bright, flaring sensation of _hope_ uncoiling in his chest, thinking that maybe, _maybe_ he’ll be able to save himself from a life of ruin by taking the hand that was now outstretched towards him. 

To no avail. That beacon of hope is shattered as he hears the footsteps approach the spiral staircase, can hear the screeching voice of Alecto, the harsh guttural sounds of Amycus’ voice as he urges Draco to kill him, _just kill him, boy!_

It’s replaced with resignation and utter, utter fear because he can't do this. He can’t look a man in the eye and watch as the light dies in his twinkling blue eyes. 

And then the choice is taken away from him completely. Severus Snape, his godfather, points his wand at Dumbledore and Draco knows that he’s bound to protect Draco because of the bond that Narcissa made him promise to, he knows _now_ that Snape was acting on Dumbledore’s orders to kill him himself. 

But he still can’t watch it. He can’t watch the way Dumbledore’s eyes are less amused and more desperate now, the way his voice is low and pleading. The way he says, “Please, Severus. Please…” only to be thrown off the tower in a blinding flash of green light as Draco’s mentor, the man he always looked up to, kills him in cold blood. 

His younger self curls up in shock, his face pinched and deathly white. That’s the first day he sees the Thestrals, the day where he knows that he is now tainted forever. 

Draco screams. He screams and he screams and he screams, because what else can he do? 

“Why have you brought me here?” he cries out, watching with horror as he sees himself grabbed by Snape to be led down the winding stairs. Harry reveals himself, his dark hair a mess, his eyes looking like broken glass, wide and wet with unshed tears. “Stop, please stop! I can’t take this!” 

_You don’t know how much you can take, Draco Malfoy. You have lived through these events, and they have scarred you. And yet, they have not killed you._

Draco doesn’t like the sound of this. The wind howls around him, and the Dark Mark lurking over the Astronomy Tower suddenly comes alive. The skull opens its mouth wide, and Draco can feel the way it wants to devour him whole. 

_I want to finish it. What should have happened many years ago will happen now, while you are in my grasp._

The skull moves closer now, the wind picking up speed as the temperature around him drops to below freezing. 

_You will wish you were dead by the time I’m done with you, Draco Malfoy._

And the skull rushes in, eyes malevolent and mouth open wide, as he’s swallowed by the residue of dark magic, blood and death.

—

Draco opens his eyes, and he’s seventeen now, almost eighteen — but in all honesty, he doesn’t believe that he’ll ever reach his eighteenth birthday — and he’s standing in the Room of Hidden Things again.

It looks _normal,_ nothing like the charred room that had opened for him when he snuck into Hogwarts after the battle was over. He can’t help but run his fingertips across the surface of the books piled high on the tables; crystal balls and Quidditch brooms and illicit potions that could never be completed, hiding centuries worth of things and secrets within these walls. He knows it’s the last time he’ll ever see this place again. 

He’s standing in a cramped lane, Crabbe and Goyle by his sides. He looks worse than he did at sixteen, his face having lost what little youth it had, devolving into the terrified, gaunt creature that stood between the hulking boys. His eyes are huge and dark, the dark circles under his eyes almost permanent. He remembers having tried to spell them off with a Freshening charm, only to realize that he could hardly hold up his wand. 

And then of course, Potter had stolen it from him. Disarmed him, even though Draco hadn’t done anything to stop him from taking his wand. Draco was unarmed and defenseless, and he’d been left to fend for himself without magic. And now here he was, waiting for Potter to show up yet again, to try and stop him from doing it. 

He doesn’t want to think about how Potter had looked the last time he’d seen him. Muddy, almost to the point where he was unrecognizable, his face matted with dried blood. His glasses had been cracked yet again — but his eyes shone a brilliant green, the raging fire in his irises never extinguished even when he faced the Dark Lord. 

A sudden noise distracts him, and then he sees the person he’s been waiting for. “That’s my wand you’re holding, Potter.” 

He looks the same. A bit older, maybe, his stubble growing out in a five o’clock shadow that looks rather attractive, despite his scruffed look. Draco can feel his heart going _thud-thud-thud_ and he’s powerless against the raging force of nature that is Harry sodding Potter.

“How come you’re not with Voldemort, huh?” 

Crabbe talks to him, his voice soft. Draco’s not really sure what he says to Potter, because he’s too busy trying not to gape at the rich, manly voice Potter had now. It’s only been a couple of months since he’d last seen him at the Manor, but he’d grown so much older in that time, more than his physical appearance could disclose. 

“How did you get in here?” and his voice is mocking now, too fucking abrasive on Draco’s ears and he snaps out a brittle reply, “I virtually lived in the Room of Hidden Things for all of last year, Potter. I know how to get in.” 

Goyle speaks up, his voice boyish with unrestrained glee, “We were hiding in the corridor outside. We can do Diss-lusion charms now! And then you turned up in front of us and started talking about a die-dum. What’s a die-dum, Potter?” 

The diadem. Of course. Draco watches with barely suppressed horror as his younger self attempts to calm Crabbe down, to stop him from burying them all in a mound of decaying junk where no one would ever find them. He can hear Ron and Hermione in the corridors beyond, a stifled scream the only indication that they aren’t dead. Of course, they aren’t dead because he’d had to endure far too many awkward dinners with them, Draco knows that, but so many of his memories colliding and mingling with each other made it hard to determine exactly what was real anymore. 

“What does it matter? It’s Potter who the Dark Lord wants, so who cares about this die-dum?” Crabbe is infuriatingly dim-witted as ever, why can’t he just- wait, fuck, Crabbe had _died_ that night, his screams the last thing Draco heard in the Room of Requirement before it was charred beyond all repair. He can remember Crabbe’s eyes, wide and frightened, his face permanently fixed in an expression of agony just before the fire consumed him whole. 

Draco presses the heels of his palms to his eyes, hot tears cascading down the side of his face as he sobs. He can’t tell up from down, his memories and thoughts entwining in a painfully twisted way, a way that feels like a burning brand in his head, like his head is being rewired to fit in these horrible, hateful experiences that will haunt him long after. 

He looks up to his younger self screaming, “Don’t kill him, don’t fucking kill him!” to Crabbe and Goyle, both of whom had their wands held out pointed towards Potter — no, _Harry_ — aiming to kill. He wonders dimly if he had always been that obvious. So obviously in love with Harry Potter that he’d try and stop his friends from killing him without the use of a wand. He’s never been brave, never wanted to sacrifice himself to save someone else’s life, and yet, he’d been continually thrust into situations where he was forced to choose. But this... this was different. 

He didn’t have to save Harry. He knows that the Dark Lord wanted to be the one to kill Harry Potter, and so they couldn’t kill him regardless of how much they wanted to. But now he wants to stand in front of Harry, arms spread wide to protect him from any stray spells his idiot friends may send his way. It’s stupid, foolish and utterly unlike himself. He doesn’t understand it himself, but he’s far too terrified to do anything but scream for them to _stop, please stop._

And then hell is unleashed, as Crabbe releases the Fiendfyre. The flames lick at the floor, gobbling up whatever they can find. They chased them through the maze of amassed things, towering over them, intent on devouring them. Draco’s running, his body too weak to move much faster than this and Goyle grabs his hand and pulls him up onto a tottering pile of books that had not yet been destroyed by the fire that was growing larger by the second. 

He wraps his arm around Goyle, who looks dangerously close — fuck, no! — to passing out. “Goyle, no! No, no, no, you can’t do this, don’t leave me here! Stay awake, stay awake!” But Greg’s eyes close anyway, his breathing laboured, as Draco tries to desperately hang on to him while the fire blazes around them, an inferno of epic proportions. 

He screams. He screams with everything he has, hoping that someone would come and save them. And it works. Harry swoops in on a broom, his green eyes determined as he stretches out a hand for Draco to grab on, but he’s too sweaty to grab on tightly, and their hands disconnect. He’ll keep trying, Draco knows, but this isn’t the time for heroics alone. Surely Harry would’ve only come back for them if he knew that his friends were safe, which meant- “If we die for them, I’ll kill you, Harry!” 

Draco’s never been more glad to see Weasley. They drag Goyle onto their broom, wrapping his arms around Granger, and shoot off into the blazing room. Harry stretches out a hand again and Draco clambers on to his broom with little grace. He wraps his arms tightly around Harry, burying his face in the place between Harry’s shoulder blades, trying to breathe in deeply the scent of something that is intrinsically _Harry._

But then his heart stutters a beat. He doesn’t know where Crabbe is — _fuck,_ where did he go? Draco jolts up so suddenly that Harry almost swerves to the right. He leans down, as far as he can go without toppling off the broom, and looks for Crabbe. His eyes are watering, he’s almost hoarse from screaming in this hellish heat, and just when he’s sure that they’ll never get out alive, he spots the door. 

“The door, get to the door, the door!” he all but screams into Harry’s ear, and miraculously, he speeds up, the broom flying faster than ever as they race the others to the door. And then he sees it. _Him._

Crabbe, far away in the maze of corridors, his arm a singed black. Draco can’t make out much more in the unwavering heat and smoke, but he can see the way Crabbe’s eyes widen with pure, unadulterated fear, the way his mouth moves, and even through the distance, Draco can make out what he says. _Help._

And then they’re out, through the door and into the corridor beyond.

__

Draco comes alive with a start, gasping for breath. Green eyes stare at him from above, wide with concern and fear. He knows those eyes, would recognize them in the middle of a large crowd, would follow them to the ends of the earth and beyond.

“Harry,” he gasps, although it doesn’t sound like anything remotely resembling his name. 

He doesn’t even know if he’s actually here, if it’s actually Harry, _his_ Harry, standing in front of him. The voice could be tricking him, making him feel as though he’s finally out of its clutches, only to drag him under again into the darkness. 

He can feel his eyes closing, his body too heavy to lift off the ground where he’s sprawled. There are muffled voices surrounding him, footsteps that echo dully on the stone floor, but at the first touch of human warmth, Draco flinches. He doesn’t- he can’t-

Draco closes his eyes, but not before watching those green eyes widen, and a soft, desperate whisper carrying him off into a dreamless sleep. 

_"I love you, Draco."_

**PART II**

Harry paces across the room, his feet nearly wearing a hole in the threadbare carpet. Draco’s been home for nearly a week, but he hasn’t spoken a word ever since they found him in that abandoned house two and a half weeks ago.

Well. Not _exactly_ true. He’s spoken, short, clipped words to the Healers when they’d come in to assess how he’d been holding up but he hasn’t spoken to _Harry._ Not a word, besides that strangled, gasped intonation of his name when he’d found Draco on the floor clutching that cursed mirror. 

They’ve identified the mirror as a Dark artifact that had been lost in the Middle Ages — an object that appeared to a person when they were at their weakest and exploited them to manifest their most painful memories as though they were actually happening around them. It had disappeared from any known recounts of history, but its trail was just as bloody as the Elder Wand’s. 

The footprints had been identified as those of the rogue Death Eaters, the ones that had escaped trial seven years ago, and had been using that house as a meeting place, but their bodies hadn’t been found as of yet. One of the Healers had a morbid suggestion as to why that could be — “Their minds weren’t able to handle the stress of undergoing all of those memories again, and at an amplified level of pain. At one point, their bodies succumbed to that level of Dark magic and probably just... _combusted._ ” 

She’d apologized after she saw the horrified look on Harry’s face but the damage was done. Draco could have been a victim of the same thing — and Harry would never have known what happened to him. 

He pauses mid-turn. He doesn’t even want to imagine what Draco must’ve gone through. If this mirror really had amplified his nightmares — some of which he still woke up from, gasping and sweaty as Harry tried to get him to calm down, to make him remember that it wasn’t real, not anymore — then Draco would need that time to recover, to recuperate. 

But it’s been weeks now, and while Harry doesn’t want to push Draco, he’d have thought that Draco would’ve been more relieved to see him. He’s taken a break from active duty to sit at home and wait for Draco to come and talk to him. Hadn’t that been one of Draco’s complaints when he’d left home after announcing that they should break-up? But so far Draco had stuck to sitting in the library in his favourite spot, or to soak in the unusual warmth of the season in the garden as he sat by the flowers. 

However, whenever Harry would peek into the library or watch him sit in the garden from the window, Draco was never actually... well, _doing_ anything. He would stare vacantly into the distance, and sometimes he’d get a small frown in the middle of his forehead. He would sit still, for hours at a time, and whenever he could be persuaded to move or eat, he would do so in jerky, robotic movements. 

Harry was worried about him, but he couldn’t do anything about it. The Healers had told him to let Draco be, because traumatic experiences leave scars and cannot be forced out. Harry gets it, of course, he does. He’d been through the same thing when he was eighteen, after Voldemort’s defeat. It had been a hard few months, and he hadn’t wanted to open up to anyone. Not even to Ron and Hermione, even though they were the ones who would actually get what he was going through. 

But this was _Draco._ His partner, his boyfriend. He’d loved Ron and Hermione too, but they were his best friends. Besides, they’d had each other after the war and Harry hadn’t wanted to intrude in on their time together. Draco, on the other hand, knows that Harry is there for him. They’d been angry that night when Draco left, yes, but he didn’t think that it would carry forward after Draco had been through so much. 

_Shit._ Harry stopped pacing and fell ungracefully onto the plush sofa, pinching the bridge of his nose. _Please, Draco,_ he prayed desperately. _Please. Come back._

—

It’s been another three days, and Harry’s losing it. Hermione’s tried to Floo-call him a dozen times, but he’s shut off the connection on his side. He doesn’t need to hear her tell him _oh Harry, do let him be, he’ll come around on his own_ or _don’t you remember what it was like?_

Of course he remembers. God, how could he not? 

He remembers the feeling of being so, so alone in this world. A world that had opened up to him, had accepted him as one of their own. A world that had given him a new family, new friends, people he grew to love and cherish. A world that had then fallen apart as everyone who loved him seemed to die to protect him, just as his mother had, all those years ago. He’d felt so utterly lost. How could he even think about putting down new roots again when everyone seemed to just keep dying to save him?

Those few months had been the roughest of his life, and it had taken a lot of Mind Healing appointments for him to realise that it wasn’t all over. He’d passed his NEWTS, joined the Auror training and then- then he’d met Draco. They’d been so perfunctory then, greeting each other with just a curt nod. But somewhere between their fifth to tenth mission — between shared jokes and pub outings and tipsy giggling as they fell into bed together once, twice, thrice — that space between them shrunk until it vanished like it had never existed. 

And that, Harry thinks resolutely, is why he needs to talk to Draco. He can’t just let him waste away, not if he can do something about it. He takes a deep breath. _Now or never._

—

Harry walks into the kitchen, his eyes falling on Draco’s still form immediately. He’s sitting on the stool by the kitchen counter. On the counter is a forgotten bowl of cereal, the spoon still cradled in his left hand as though he doesn’t even remember that he’s holding it.

Harry stops to watch him. Draco’s not conventionally handsome— his jawline too sharp, his nose too long. But standing there, the sunlight slating through his white blond locks as they fall softly around his face, his grey eyes shining a molten silver, his white shirt open at the collar- God. He feels suckerpunched, because Draco is so effortlessly gorgeous without even trying. But on looking closer, he can see the way Draco’s eyes are ripped of their extreme vitality, the way the spoon trembles in his hand, how gaunt his cheeks are. 

He walks over to Draco, his footsteps almost too loud in the quiet of the room. Draco hasn’t acknowledged him yet, his gaze unfocused. Harry sidles up to him, taking the spoon from Draco’s hand gently and setting it back down on the counter. He doesn’t let go of Draco’s hand though, instead, he threads his own fingers through Draco’s. The stark contrast between his knobbly fingers and Draco’s slim ones is always one that Harry has admired, and he rubs his thumb over Draco’s knuckles slowly, gently. 

He starts talking. “Draco, love,” he breaks off. His voice is too scratchy, too loud in the stillness of their apartment. He tries again. “Draco. I don’t know if you can hear me, but- but I have to say _something._ I’m going mad hearing the sound of only my voice, and I just- God, I want you back, Draco. Please. Please, baby, don’t do this. I want to help. Please, just- just _talk_ to me.” He can hear the way he sounds increasingly desperate, his voice choking up with every word he says. 

All he wants is _his_ Draco back. The one who never gave up without a fight; the one who has his own jagged, ruined edges, but those same edges match up so perfectly with Harry's own. He clutches Draco’s hand, gripping it more tightly than he should but he can’t help it. “Please, Draco, please. Please come back, come back to me. Talk to me, say something, God. I’ve been miserable these last few weeks, Draco, please just- just say _something_ to me.” 

He can almost see the way the fog in Draco’s eyes is clearing up, slowly but surely, the way his words have penetrated through his subconscious enough to bring him back. But maybe Draco needs an extra push. 

Harry swallows and licks his lips. God, this is terrifying. “I love you, Draco. Please. Don’t leave me like this.” 

Draco turns to him, eyes clear and wide with disbelief. He must have heard Harry, or at least his last words. Harry tries not to squirm as Draco’s eyes pin him to place. It’s the first time he’d ever said those words out loud, in earshot of Draco, and he’d not sure if he should have said it only to bring Draco back, but now it’s too late. A myriad of emotions flit across Draco’s face, flickering too fast for Harry to parse through them, for him to understand what the hell Draco was thinking. 

“You don’t.” 

The words are hoarse, hardly a whisper. It speaks volumes that Draco’s first words are those and he chooses to negate the words Harry just said. It was his first declaration of love to Draco and all he can say is, _you don’t._

Draco takes a breath, and opens his mouth to speak again, “You don’t.” His voice is still just as hoarse, but his eyes are steely, tinged with bitterness. 

And Harry feels those words like a kick in the chest, his ribs buckling under the pressure. He can feel the uneasy prick of tears at the corners of his eyes, his throat closing up as he tries to speak. 

“What?” 

“You don’t love me, Harry.” As if he hadn’t heard it the last two times Draco said it. But the worst part, the absolute worst part of it was that Draco sounded so- so _broken._

Harry hates that sound. That sense of raw vulnerability, so unlike the carefully guarded exterior Draco usually put up, is jarring. And God, it is so, so wrong. Draco should never have cause to sound like that, and especially not because of Harry. He has to make it right. 

“I do, God. Draco, listen to me, I do. I know I’d never said it to you.. But then you were _gone_ for nearly forty eight hours, and those were the worst two days I’ve spent in my entire life, because I didn’t know if you were even alive!” Harry’s almost yelling now, and he makes an effort to bring his voice lower. “I was in agony, Draco. And I kept thinking, that I let you go. I _let you go_ , and if you never came back it would be- it would be my fault.” His voice cracks on the last word, and suddenly he can’t speak. 

It’s like reliving those two days all over again, hunched over in misery as he berated and blamed himself for allowing it to get this bad. He thinks of Draco, trapped in a malicious mirror, all of his worst memories played out in front of him, all the pain and suffering multiplied by a hundredfold — and he aches with the feeling of wanting to wrap Draco in his arms and never let him go. To tell him that he loves him, every moment of every day, for the rest of their lives. 

“I love you. You don’t believe me now, but I do. I love you, Draco, so much, God- it’s insane. I’ve been trying to run away from it, but I can’t- I love you. I really do.” 

Draco doesn’t look up at him. Instead, he plucks at a stray thread in his shirt, wrapping it around one long finger. “You don’t love me, Harry.” 

And before Harry can break down over the fact that Draco may be alive and well and able to speak, but is doomed to repeat that damning sentence over and over again like a faulty tape recorder— Draco speaks up again. “You think you’re in love with me. I know you believe it’s real. But it’s not.” 

Every word Draco says is short, clipped. It’s not emotionless but it has a sense of detachment that Harry is unable to parse. 

“What do you mean, it’s _not?_ ” Like Harry is a child, like he doesn’t know how to tell whether or not he’s in love with Draco Malfoy. 

Draco almost sounds tired, like he wants to just go to sleep. “ All the people you love die, Harry. That’s what you think. And now that it happened to me, you now fancy yourself in love with me. That’s all.” 

“I- that’s not true! It was a war, Draco, people die! And it happens to both sides, and it just so happened that it took people who were close to me. That doesn’t mean that I have some- I don’t know, some _repressed_ feelings about death taking away my loved ones.” 

“I believe that you _think_ you love me. But you love me because you feel like I will disappear. Not because you truly do.” Draco’s voice is cool, no inflection in it. It reminds Harry of the familiar sneering expression Harry had become so accustomed to seeing during their time in Hogwarts. He hates it, he hates it so much. He hates that it makes him feel like a teenager again, unable to keep his temper. He hates that he wants to lash out, that he wants to grab Draco by the shoulders and make him understand. 

He’s immediately horrified at the thought. 

“I am not a toy, Potter. I cannot be loved one day and then discarded the next.” 

_What?_ All his anger leaves him in a rush. He doesn’t want to _discard_ Draco, what does that even mean? If anything, he’s terrified that Draco’s going to leave _him,_ move onto someone who’s more capable, someone who can love in the way he deserves. 

Harry doesn’t know how to explain it. But he’s gone beyond coherence now, and he wildly exclaims, his hands spread wide. “I’m not- Draco, please, just listen to me. I know where I stand on this, okay? I love you—” 

“It still feels like you’re trying to convince yourself, Harry. If you love me, then why the fuck would you avoid me for weeks when I told you I love you? Why the fuck would you leave me alone to worry, to doubt that you shared even an iota of what I felt for you? Why would you make me feel like I’m worthless, like I was just another person for you to save?” Draco’s not as cool now, a spot of color high on his cheeks, his face pinched. His cold grey eyes flash like quicksilver as he darts a glance at Harry. 

Harry’s almost shocked into silence. “W-what? I never meant- You’ve got it all wrong, Draco, I just—”

“Then _what?_ What did you mean?” 

Harry’s still so shocked, his brain whirring as he tries to make sense of it all. Yes, he had never acknowledged Draco’s declaration of love for him, he’d been too disconcerted at the time to reciprocate the sentiment and after that, he’d shoved it to the corner of his mind because he didn’t know how to respond to that — but _worthless?_ Was that really what Draco thought? 

Harry can’t help it. He explodes. “God, I don’t know! We were okay! We were fine, together, weren’t we? We were- we were _happy._ It was all going to be fine. We lived together, we had a life together, we came back home from work and we cuddled and we had sex — and it was all _fine!_ Great, even!” He’s panting now, his chest heaving as he spits the words out, loud and desperate. “And then- then you told me you _loved_ me, and I’d never even considered it before because I thought- I thought—” he trails off, unable to reconcile his rational mind to speak coherently, to make Draco understand. 

“You thought what? That Death Eater scum like me couldn’t possibly experience nuanced emotions like, oh, I don’t know, _love?_ Or affection or tenderness? That once branded with this fucking Mark,” Draco pulls up the sleeve of his shirt, brandishing the mentioned Mark, his eyes growing hard and flinty as he saw Harry’s instinctive flinch, “we just ceased to care for anyone?” 

“NO! No, God, Draco, how could you even think that? It’s just that, all my life, every single time I thought I had something good, something that was _mine_ to hold on to, it just vanished. People came and went, people who loved me, people who cared for me. They all died. Well, not all, but a significant amount of them did.” Harry pauses, runs a hand through his hair. “Shit, maybe you’re right about the death and love thing- but you have to know that I love you, Draco. I don’t know what I thought at that time, or if I was thinking at all — but I guess I thought that-”

Draco continues gently, his furious expression melting away into blankness, “You thought I was going to disappear from your life, or die, or just go away because that’s what happens when people love you.” 

Harry lets out a breath. “Yes. God, it sounds so- so _stupid._ As though telling you how much I love you, how much I’m _in_ love with you could ever change anything. Actually— ” Harry chuckles, but it’s forced, a sound he has to force out of his mouth before he starts to cry. “Actually, if I’d told you how I felt about you, if I’d just _said_ it, you wouldn’t have stormed out, you wouldn’t have taken that assignment— none of this would have happened, if I hadn’t been such a fucking git.”

Draco says nothing. Harry doesn’t really expect him to, anyway. 

“I’m sorry, Draco. I’m so, so sorry. I don’t even know how to apologize to you. Allowing you to walk out of that door was the biggest mistake I’ve ever made. And so was making you feel so horrible that you’d rather fall headfirst into an evil mirror that made you go through your nightmares over and over.”

Harry places a hand on the table, palm facing upward. It’s far away enough from Draco’s own that it doesn’t seem intentional. He knows that Draco likes to engage in physical contact when he’s feeling low, but he hasn’t yet asked for it explicitly. And Harry doesn’t want to presume — not now. Not ever. But he lets the invitation stand. 

“I’m going to spend the rest of my life trying to make up for this. Even—” he coughs, trying to not let the lump in his throat overpower him, “Even if we break-up. I’m so sorry, Draco, I’m so sorry—” 

And now he’s crying, hot salty tears making their way down his face, and he hasn’t cried, not for seven years. Not since he saw the bodies of Remus and Tonks and Fred and Colin, all in a line, covered with white sheets. It feels like such a foreign emotion now, and he can’t help it, but the thought that he may be losing the one reason that made his current life worth living makes him want to get on one knee and beg. He starts to curl within himself, “I’m so sorry, baby, I’m so sorry, God, I didn’t mean—” 

Long fingers thread between his own, skittering across his palm as they touch him delicately. They feel so right, Draco’s fingers in between his own. Harry looks up, just for a second, just to glimpse the expression on Draco’s face as he accepts Harry’s offer of physical contact — 

And Draco’s eyes find Harry’s own and something passes between them, something Harry can’t ever put a name to, something he knows is infinitely more precious than anything he’s ever felt before because it’s made of the same stuff that stars and galaxies and eternities were formed from. It’s deep and visceral in a way nothing else in his life has ever been. 

And then Draco’s next to him, pulling Harry close to him, tucking him in between his arms as he murmurs softly into Harry’s hair, “Come now, love. It’s okay.” 

Harry sobs. He cries for his parents, his friends, his family — people who have loved him, people who he knows are watching over him at every step of the way. He cries for the people he never knew, and he cries for the people he got to know and love, but who were taken away from him too soon. He cries for all those times he’s stoically maintained himself for the last seven years, for the loss of his youth, for being so deathly afraid of letting anyone in again that he pushed away the best thing that ever happened to him. 

Slowly, he winds down, his sobs turning into wet sniffles as he gasps against Draco’s shoulder. He moves away slightly to look at Draco, seeing red-rimmed eyes directed back at him. Draco’s grey eyes are bloodshot, his face flushed and blotchy as tear tracks line his face. If Harry had thought that Draco’s defences were down before, this was vulnerability like Draco had never once expressed before. 

Harry wants to say something, anything. He wants to hold Draco close forever, he wants Draco inside of him, around him, surrounding him completely. He wants to be part of Draco, to devour him, to crawl inside his skin and merge with him in a way the universe hasn’t managed to create yet. 

It’s terrifying, is what it is. He can’t imagine that once upon a time, hardly two months ago, he’d been content with never telling Draco just how much he loves him and now he can’t stop the words from flowing out of him. He wants to spend every single moment of infinity telling Draco he loves him. And he can’t say any of what he’s thinking, he can’t do it — so instead, he says, “Kiss me.” 

Draco’s eyes grow round and wide, but he must hear the desperation in Harry’s voice, because he places a hand at the nape of Harry’s neck and pulls him closer. He pulls him in closer, and closer until they’re sharing the same breaths, inhaling and exhaling with the rhythm of their heartbeats. And then Draco tilts his head down and kisses him — soft, featherlike touches on Harry’s mouth and nose and cheeks and eyelids. Harry makes a weak sound at the back of his throat, tears threatening to escape from the edges of his closed eyes. 

He thought he knew what love was. Strong and familiar, like coming home. The aroma of freshly baked bread, the feeling of wrapping yourself into someone for a warm hug. Love was warm and safe and gentle and kind. But as Draco undresses him, so softly and gently, his mouth a burning touch against Harry’s body — Harry realises that love isn’t that. Love is dangerous. Love is all the parts of yourself that you never understood, because they were never yours to begin with. 

It’s slow and beautiful, the way Draco opens him up, one finger then two, all the while caressing Harry’s body. Harry pulls him in for a kiss, his hands shaking on either side of Draco’s face. He writhes as Draco fills him up, sliding into him unhesitatingly, joining them together and claiming him in the most carnal way known to man. They merge together, in the only way they know how, and it’s not quite enough for Harry, now that he knows just how much he wants to consume and be consumed by Draco, to love him in all the ways he knows how — but it’s okay. It’s enough for now. 

It’s not all gentle, of course. Love is a tempestuous mistress: quiet and pliant one moment, and raging and roaring the next. Harry knows this now. They gasp and moan together, harsh pants loud in the quiet room, climaxing as one. As Draco looks down at him, his hair dark blond with sweat, his eyes soft and his smile softer, Harry falls in love with him again. And again, and again. He feels like this is what it’s supposed to be — the love you have for someone growing every single day, until you can’t imagine what it was to live without it. 

They lie together, tangled legs and entwined hearts, shaking in the aftermath. 

“I love you, Draco.” 

Draco sighs, a little puff of air skittering across Harry’s chest. “I know you do.” 

“Then tell me how to fix it. Tell me how we can fix _us._ ” 

There’s a long pause, and Harry would think that Draco’s fallen asleep, but the line of Draco’s body is tense, his breaths uneven. 

“The things I saw in there — while I was in the mirror — they made me realize something.” Draco’s voice is soft, thoughtful, but it holds a certain gravity. “It really shook me up, the whole experience, because it’s not just me living out my nightmares again, but me watching helplessly as I made all the wrong choices over and over. Everything was so detailed that you’d never guess it wasn’t real, that you weren’t actually there. And that was another thing. They were all my worst memories, but they _all_ involved you, in some way.” 

Draco must sense him stiffening in his arms, because he continues gently, “You weren’t necessarily the main cause of them, but you were there. And it made me wonder why you were part of my happiest memories and the worst ones I’ve ever had to face. It’s been a long few weeks and I’m still no closer to finding an answer.” 

Harry’s stunned. “What does it mean, then?” 

Draco sighs. “I don’t know, but maybe it would be helpful if we both took some time off to re-examine this relationship.” At Harry’s sharp intake of breath, he chuckles wryly. “Don’t you see? We can’t just patch up whatever is left of us and hope it’ll turn out okay, because we know it won’t. Next time this happens, it’ll be far worse, and neither of us may recover from the fallout. We both need time and space, away from each other.. It took me almost dying for you to acknowledge that you do love me! I need time to recover, and you need to decide if you can put aside your fears and guilt and actually let yourself be happy with what you have right now.” 

Draco’s right. He doesn’t deserve to be burdened with Harry’s problems too, not when they both need their own space to figure all of their problems out. 

“Okay. You’re right. You’re absolutely right. We both need it.” 

As soon as he says the words, it feels like a weight has been lifted from the room. It feels easier to breathe in, to turn his head over to Draco and just smile at him. 

“I’m sorry I couldn’t be what you needed, Draco.” 

“I know, love, I know,” and Draco’s clutching him close to his body again, carding his long fingers in Harry’s hair gently. “I know you love me. You would never have hurt me intentionally, and I know. It’s okay. It’s okay, now.” 

Harry wants to talk more, to know exactly what is going to happen — will they move out of their house? And if so, who would move where? How long is enough time to start healing? How will they navigate this new dynamic between them? — but even as the questions crowd his mind, he can’t help but close his eyes. 

_Just for a moment,_ he promises himself. But his body betrays him, and he falls asleep — but not before he hears Draco say, in the softest voice imaginable, in a way that makes Harry feel as though he isn’t actually meant to hear it, “I love you, Harry.”

_Epilogue_

Draco’s sitting on the windowsill again. It’s a new habit, this. He likes to look out at the world from here — the hustle-bustle of the people below, the pitter-patter of raindrops tracing crooked lines on the windows, the warmth of the sun during sunny afternoons when the entire apartment is lit up in a golden glow.

It's just a one bedroom flat, but it’s high up, nearly fifteen floors. It’s nothing like he’s used to, but it’s comforting all the same. Reminds him that everything changes, no matter how hard you try to hold on to the past. 

And hold on to the past, he doesn’t. He doesn’t want to run away from it, not like he had earlier, but he doesn’t want to cling to those memories. He wants to let them fade away, like crumbling leaves in the autumn sunlight. 

Except for one thing, or rather, one person. 

Harry’s been coming around more often, his visits bordering on almost daily as he comes over to Draco’s new place. _It’s only temporary,_ Draco had assured him. Harry had wanted him to stay in their house while he moved out for sometime, but Draco wouldn’t hear of it. For one, he genuinely didn’t want Harry to muck around looking for a new place while Draco sorted himself out. And for another, well, he couldn’t possibly be distant from him if he was living in a place where everything reminded him of Harry. 

In the beginning, he’d let the distance speak the words for him. He didn’t want Harry here yet. Not in this new space, not when he wanted an untouched place to think in, to breathe in. He took leave from work, citing mental recovery and Robards let him. He probably felt guilty for letting Draco go in alone, even though it was Draco’s own fault. 

He knows that everyone thought that it would break him. That the incident with the mirror would leave him permanently impaired, because no one should be able to go through that sort of heightened terror and come out even remotely sane. 

He can still remember the words of the voice, ringing like a bell in his ears, sweet and beautiful at first and steadily becoming more horrid and painful -- making him jolt awake in the middle of the night. But sometimes, he can’t help but wonder if it may have _helped_ him. It sounds mad, he knows. A mirror full of Dark magic, one that entrapped him within the confines of his own mind, dredging up one awful memory after another -- how could it have helped him in any way? 

The voice promised him pain. It promised him suffering and agony and death. Yet, it let him go. Harry had only shot a basic revealing spell at the mirror, and Draco had gasped and breathed in the air of the living world. Everyone was too relieved to question it further, but Draco wondered. It was a mystery, perhaps never to be solved, but he liked the idea that the mirror had let him go, to allow him to find his happiness. To allow him to let go of his past and all the memories he’d been dragging around with him and truly begin to live. 

And as the months passed and autumn turned to winter turned to spring he found himself opening up his house and, dare he say it, his heart to Harry once again. 

Just as he thinks it, there’s a knock on the door. Right on time, for once. Draco pads across the floor, his feet clenching involuntarily at the feel of the cool marble floor, but it’s another thing he’s somehow come to love. 

Harry’s standing there, his cheeks flushed pink with warmth. It’s almost humid nowadays, and Harry’s clearly walked for longer than he should have, balancing far too many cartons of takeaway in his arms. 

“Oh, get in here, you idiot. Who walks in this atrocious weather?” 

Harry ignores him. The twat. “How did your therapy session go today?” 

Draco rolls his eyes, but answers nonetheless, turning away from Harry to remove the containers. “Tanya asked me what I want to do, and I told her that I don’t think I can go back to being an Auror.” 

There’s a split second of silence, and then Harry says carefully, “Oh?” 

Draco takes in a deep breath. “Yes. I don’t think I ever really enjoyed it, anyway. I mostly did it because I had to recover the Malfoy family name and because my father had hated Aurors. Spite and necessity never mix well, and I don’t think I’m really suited for the job.” 

“So what will you do, then?” It’s gentle, nothing like the raised tones and screeched arguments of the old. 

“I don’t know, really. Neville’s asked me if I’d like to join him at working in his greenhouse especially as Ginevra’s pregnant now.” He shrugs, biting his lip nervously. “And I thought, why not? I’ve always liked Herbology. If he needs help with the potions for the plants, I can do that too. It’s not like I need the money. I just want to do something that’s truly just for myself.” 

Slowly, haltingly, Harry says, “I can understand that. Doing something for yourself, I mean.” He smiles at Draco, small and honest. “I’m glad.” 

Harry takes a breath, and rubs his hand at the nape of his neck. Draco knows that nervous tick of his. He’s embarrassed. 

“Harry—”

“Hey.” He gives Draco a smile. “I know you know that I’m embarrassed. But it’s because I’m not sure how to do this. I haven’t— I haven’t spoken freely to anyone in years. But I want to try. I want to be the best version of myself, because now I know that what I was doing was just surviving the aftermath. Not living. I wasn’t _living,_ Draco.” Harry’s voice breaks, but he soldiers through it. “I don’t think I’ll ever be perfect or whole. Neither will you. But we fit together, you and I, our jagged edges making something beautiful. It’s not perfect either, but it’s ours.”

Draco wants to reach out and envelop Harry in his arms. He’s always been weak for this man. But he waits, wanting Harry to finish. 

“I love you.” Harry looks up at him shyly, his green eyes fixed on Draco. He’s been saying it to Draco every day for a good part of the last year, but he always says it with such adoration that Draco feels his heart flutter every single damned time. 

They’ve come so far, both of them. It feels like a miracle that they’ve pushed through everything that has been thrown at them, things that other people could go lifetimes without having witnessed, only to survive and emerge even stronger. 

It’s made them weaker too, but right now, standing in his kitchen with the afternoon sunlight slating through the wide windows and casting the whole room in a warm glow, Draco can’t think of anything better. 

Harry catches him smiling, and he doesn’t ask why. Instead he smiles back, hesitant at first, but it grows brighter the longer they go on. 

Harry’s right. They’re not perfect and they probably will never be. But Draco’s never wanted perfect. All he’s ever wanted is Harry, his to hold and love. And now that they’re pushing through their issues instead of pushing them away, Draco finds himself falling harder for Harry Potter. 

The Harry Potter he’s grown to love isn’t the Saviour, isn’t the Chosen One or the Boy Who Lived. He’s Draco’s _Harry,_ the man who sleeps wearing pajamas with fluttering snitches and broomsticks on them, the man who can burn water but can make Draco the best and greasiest fry-up he’s ever had. He’s the man who places his loyalties to his friends highest on his list, and the man who kisses Draco like he’s burning and Draco is his salvation. 

Draco is in love with Harry Potter, and Heaven help him, but Harry Potter loves him too. And that’s all he needs. 

Draco moves closer to Harry, tucking himself into his arms, slotting in perfectly against his body. He whispers into the crook of Harry’s neck, pressing his lips firmly like he’s imparting a prayer, or maybe a promise. “I love you too, Harry. I love you too.”

_Fin_

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilery Warning: additional tag Break Up and Make Up
> 
> \--
> 
> Remember to leave some love for the creator if you can! Come reblog this work and view others from this fest [HERE](https://hd-hurtfest.tumblr.com/) on the H/D Hurt!Fest tumblr page!


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